Tuesday, March 21, 2017

(Insert Title Here)

President Trump's administration is weighing sanctions against North Korea in an effort to curb Pyongyang's nuclear program, Reuters reported on Tuesday.

The
report says the sanctions would be aimed at placing diplomatic and
economic pressure, specifically focused on Chinese banks conducting
business with North Korea.

The latter seems a better approach. China, as North Korea's backer, is an integral part of the problem.

Yes, because if thinking individuals saw what they were up, they would try to stop them:

Opposition parties slammed the Liberal government on Tuesday for
trying to “ram through” major changes to how the House of Commons does
its business.

With little notice, the Liberals moved Tuesday to have the Procedure
and House Affairs committee study major changes to standing orders put
forward by Liberal House leader Bardish Chagger, giving a tight June
deadline and offering no indication that they wouldn’t use a majority to
impose changes to House rules without opposition consent.

The long list of items for study includes: halting House sittings on
Fridays; only requiring the prime minister to be in question period one
day a week; introducing electronic voting and restricting opposition
parties’ ability to filibuster bills in committee.

Liberals are trying to “ram through whatever the f— they want,”
Conservative MP Scott Reid said in a rare outburst. He called maneuvers
“despicable,” a “tissue of lies,” and a “contemptible abuse of our
system,” calling the prime minister an “arrogant, selfish, rude
individual” for trying to steamroll all opposition.

His colleague Blake Richards said the Liberals’ attempt to use the
committee to push changes through is “disgusting and pathetic.”

In an unusual move Tuesday, Liberals repeatedly blocked opposition
attempts to delay the motion, including extending the committee meeting —
which was otherwise supposed to be hearing from Elections Canada
officials, who were dismissed — well beyond its scheduled time. The
committee was still sitting by the time question period began
Wednesday.

It’s doubtful that Rand would be all that enthusiastic about Ottawa’s
plan to boost middle-class fortunes by showering billions in federal
money on thousands of upper-class business and political rent seekers.
As a champion of the middle class, maybe Morneau could take up Rand as a
policy guide rather than the redistributionists and panderers he now
consults.

Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau's controversial family vacation to a private
island in the Bahamas owned by the Aga Khan cost Canadian taxpayers more
than $127,000, including thousands of dollars in per diems for
government employees who also made the trip.

According
to documents tabled in the House of Commons, overtime and shift
differentials alone for the RCMP officers who accompanied him cost
$18,735. The force paid another $53,253 in travel, accommodation and per
diem costs.

Trudeau's flight
to the Bahamas aboard a CC-144 Challenger cost the Department of
National Defence $32,000, plus another $1,720 for food, beverages and
associated fees.

Trudeau
has come under fire in the House of Commons for taking the trip over
the Christmas holidays and for his office's initial refusal to disclose
where he was vacationing. Billionaire Aga Khan is the spiritual leader
of the world's Ismaili Muslims.

Trudeau
was accompanied on the trip by MP Seamus O'Regan and his husband, as
well as Liberal Party president Anna Gainey and her husband, Tom
Pitfield, a key member of Trudeau's election campaign team.

Trudeau
has defended the trip, arguing that the Aga Khan is a longtime family
friend. He has reimbursed taxpayers $4,895 for the trip — the cost of
commercial plane tickets for him and his family.

Government
security rules require that the prime minister not travel on commercial
aircraft — even for personal vacations with their families.

For the refreshing honesty of it all, I wish that Chrystia Freeland would just admit that she has no damn idea what she will do about this:

Canada's government, under pressure from
domestic steel firms, is expressing concern to U.S. officials about a
proposed Buy America policy that could cause heavy Canadian job losses,
people familiar with the discussions told Reuters.

U.S. President Donald Trump, who wants firms to "Buy American
and hire American," pledged in January to require new pipelines to use
U.S.-made steel.

Canadian steel firms fear Trump's plan could badly hurt a
highly-integrated North American industry, and are pressing Ottawa to
take action, the people added.

Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland raised the issue
with U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in their first conversation on
March 9 and underscored worries about potential job losses, said a
source familiar with the matter.

A statement issued after the meeting merely said that Freeland
had highlighted "the mutual benefits of the integrated Canada-U.S. steel
industry" but made no mention of the conversation about job losses.

In Washington, a Commerce Department official said Freeland had
raised the Buy American issue during the call and that Ross noted her
concerns. The official did not give further details.

Freeland spokesman Alex Lawrence said the minister would "continue to defend our steel workers" but gave no details.

More than five years after the trial ended, the lawyer for one of the
people convicted in the 2009 killing of four women in Kingston is suing
his client’s husband for unpaid legal fees.

On the first day of a civil trial at the Frontenac County Court
House, David Crowe, who defended Tooba Mohammad Yahya between mid-2009
and early 2012 on four counts of murder, said he is owed more than
$100,000.

In late January 2012, Yahya, her husband, Mohammad Shafia, and their
son Hamed were convicted of killing Yahya and Mohammad’s three teenage
daughters — Zainab, 19, Sahar, 17, and Geeti, 13 — and Mohammad’s first
wife, Rona Amir Mohammad, 52, to preserve their family honour.

In the early hours of June 30, 2009, as the family members were
returning from a vacation in Niagara Falls, they stopped at Kingston
Mills, where the women were killed, possibly predrowned there, and their
bodies put back in the car and dumped into the Rideau Canal near
Kingston Mills.

Crowe testified that he was retained to represent Yahya, but from the
outset of the case it was made clear to him that Shafia would be paying
the defence costs.

Crowe said he initially charged $450 an hour for Yahya’s defence.

In October 2010, Shafia asked for Crowe to lower his fee, and a new rate of $365 was negotiated, Crowe said.

In December 2011, as his fees for services began to outpace the money
the family was putting forward and the outstanding amounts started to
add up, Crowe said he offered to again lower his rate to $350 if Shafia
paid the overdue amounts promptly, he said.

In March 2012, after the trial had wrapped up, Crowe offered to
reduce the outstanding amount to just less than $67,000 in an effort to
compel Shafia to pay his bill. There was no response to that offer,
Crowe said.

Crowe said he discussed his fee with Shafia during meetings in a room
in the basement of the Frontenac County Court House. The meetings
included all three family members on trial, their attorneys and an
interpreter, he said.

While Yahya was present, Crowe said she did not participate in the discussions about Crowe’s fees.

Gee, who would have thought that killing one's family would be so expensive?

Vain people often post questionable photos or videos of their alleged weight loss, stretch marks, or failure of skateboards to clear immovable objects because they want their trite lives brightened by the attention.

Police and security experts say increasing police diversity in
communities like the largely Muslim borough of Molenbeek, where a key
suspect in the Paris attacks lived and then hid, is crucial for
improving intelligence and spotting radicalization.

While Belgian officials want more tip-offs to prevent the kind
of militant attacks that killed 130 people in Paris on Nov. 13, 2015 and
32 people in the Brussels metro and airport on March 22, they have
struggled to open the police to the country's Muslim minority.

On the eve of the anniversary of the Brussels attacks, Prime
Minister Charles Michel told Reuters Belgium was "very determined" to
recruit a force that would better mirror the diversity of the
population.

Let's see how that works out. If people will not obey the law now, they won't obey it with token Muslims in uniform.